Last blog of the trip. We arrived home midnight last night. After Oona’s shifter blew apart we returned to Jim and Jan Cohoon’s gluten-free bakery in Port Williams. We had spent the night at their house and Oona and the Cohoon’s daughter Emma, also about to turn ten, had really hit it off. Jim and Emma offered to take us down to Digby, and Oona latched right on to that idea. Emotionally we were both done. So we took the ride, made the ferry across the Bay of Fundy to St. John,NB and waited on the othr side for Regina and Asher to come and get us.

A note on cars: On a bicycle, trying to share a busy shoulderless road with agressive, horn honking screamers can be a bit daunting. One really gets a sense of the inherent brutality and violence of automobiles and trucks, and how that power can turn normally gracious people into raving demons. All along the way we had the constant reminder of roadkill– mink, squirrel, sparrow, butterflies, skunks, etc.–all dead on the road, sans requiem.

he word from wolfville. Oona’s bike has some minor trouble. We hope to have it repaired by noon and be on our way again. Oona is tired. She has pretty much had enough so I will try to get her home asap. She has done incredibly well an I am very proud of her. She has played in the big leagues of cycle touring for a week and that’s pretty respectable for a ten year old.

The biggest wolf in wolfville

Theodore Too, Halifax

rainy day tourist, Halifax

Met with Peter Tyedmers and his son last night and went out for Thai food down on barrington or near there. With two ten-year-olds at the table who have heard all our talk before, we did not get to go as deep as we might have, but we did get to a few places. Peter expounded on an aspect of something I talk about a lot, how we are cas ading down declining ecosystems. We use technology to boost production in the short term, but when the capacity of the technology is exhausted, it usually exhausts the supporting natural capital as well.
As Peter put it, the capture fisheries people
Come to us with problems and they want solutions. They don’t want to look at energy issues. Here we are, after 70 years, and the amount of fuel burned per ton of fish landed is still going up. We have the data from back in the 1930’s and 40’s and even with 30’s and 40’s boats and engines the amount of fuel use was lower. What’s happened? We’ve exhausted the resource. All the improvements haven’t improved anything.
What peter is saying is that They haven’t increased efficiancy wher it counts, in the fuel use per ton of fish landed ratio. Essentially we are getting less and it’s costing us more. What that leads to is disaster

August 10, Halifax

Pedaled hard all day yesterday from Grand Pre, the site of the beginning og the deportation of the French Acadians from Nova Scotia in 1755, Ethnic cleansing. This is where they loaded the Acadians onto boats, families were separated and dumped in cities all along the eastern seaboard from Boston to Savannah, tough times and but many Acadians did return and telling about la Grand Derangement, can still make them well up with emotion.

Got a charger for my iPhone here and will resume efforts to update via the WordPress App.

We have been working hard the last couple of days, 60 miles a day, the dikes into wolfville were the best part of the ride so far. We got that tip from Jim and his daughter Emma, yesterday a guy and his daughter selling lemonade told us about Uniake Estate, a park where we took a long rest before riding the highway to Lower Sackville, from there we took a city bus into town and have scored a dorm room at St. Mary’s. The plan is to stay two nights and meet with Peter Tyedmers, ecological economist, for dinner. Hopefully Peter’s son Adam and Oona can entertain each other while Peter and I talk the talk.

I’ll fill you in on what comes of that.

August 8, Wolfville (wolfvull), Nova Scotia

Cycled out of Young’s Cove and traveled up and down the mountain all day, stopped at Port Georgeand had our picnic. there was ayoung boy there, about 7, he had only one leg, but he was jumping around the rocks with the help of crutches, the kind that grab the forearm, keeping up with the others, it was great to see such a strong heart. I asked if I could take his picture, he said no. rock formations, Port George, NS

We went down a steep gravel road and Oona ate it twice, tears but no blood. I said why aren’t you using your back breaks, she said, they don’t work. Lesson learned, check your daughter’s bike thoroughly befor statinga tour. Brakes fixed now. We have been riding 40 miles a day.

Camped at some nice folks yard last night, Jeremy and Shelley, and their 2 yr old daughter Brooklin.

I am not wrestling with the technology so much any more becauseI left my charger cord behind at rodney and Marian’s and so my iphone is dead. Problems solved!

Oona and I pulled out ov Victoria Harbour this morning at 7:00 and reached Wolfville at 1:30, very good time with the wind on our backs, spotted a deer along the way. Had tea at a little shop in Port william where Oona made friends with the daughter Emma, both of them virgos, about to turn 10. emma and her father put us onto a great little bike trail along the tops of the old dikes built by our Acadian ancestors 400 yrs ago. Wefollowed the grassy trail along the river from Port William to Wolfville. and will follow them up to Grand Pre in a little while. bike trail along the dike. Port William, NS

Yesterday passed a hundred cyclists in a tour called “In Motion Events” they were doing 60-70 miles a day and age ranged from 7 to 70. The 7 yr old girl was riding tandem with her dad. So Oona is not the youngest bike tourer out here, but I think probably the youngest self-supported, and she is doing very well.

Fundy tides, annapolis royal, ns

tidal power plant, annapolis royal, ns

August 7

Stayed up late listening to Rodney’s stories: about the draft dogers that com up- here in the 60’s that’s what we caled m , draft dogers, I’ll tell ya the first winter thinned a lot of them out. then one of them had a horse that big old draft horse kicked him right inthe face killed him dead. then there was a bunch goin down over the mountain in an old truck, folks around here yused to sell’m all kinds of junk. that thing lost its brakes, a whoil bunch of’m ridin’ in the back from one of them communes they had. One of them panicked and jumped out. his feet hit the ground so hard it split his liver right in two, killed him right there.

He went on about how the goverment had screwed up the fisheries, all the same stuff I write about in my books, he said the fishermen were their own worst enemies cuz they helped the governmet if they thought they could make a little money.

We’re off to Wolfvile, might make it to Halifax this trip .

August 5, East Machias, Maine

I was heading out on acycle tour when my daughter Oona stopped me. “Not without me Papa.” So off we go, on her first cycling tour, a tenth birthday present.Part of the deal is that she’ll take me on a cycle tour when I’m 80.

We plan to use this as an opportunity to experiment with iPhone journalism and will be updating this page whenever we score a wifi connection, as usual we will not be sticklers for grammar, spelling or punctuation.

August 5: East Machias, Maine. Last minute flurry, we are leaving for the St. John, NB/Digby,NS ferry in a little while, the plan is to ride up the Annapolis Valley and then from Wolfville either come back the same route or circle roudn through Halifax and Lunenburg. We’ll keep you posted.N